Lost Embrace

Daniel Burman's 2004 Argentine film is a quiet story of identity set in a shopping arcade in Buenos Aires. Ariel Makaroff, a Jewish Argentine in his twenties, has dropped out of architecture school and drifts through the arcade where his mother has a lingerie shop and his brother runs an import business; what actually preoccupies him is why his father left for Israel years ago and never came back. Meanwhile Ariel is trying to prove Polish descent to obtain a European passport, looking for a way to leave while searching for a reason to stay. Burman's storytelling rests on place rather than plot; the arcade is nearly a neighbourhood and everyone in it is involved in everyone else's life. Daniel Hendler's performance is measured, and the film's humour comes from that measure. It won the grand jury prize at the Berlin International Film Festival, along with best actor for Hendler. Who it's for: viewers who like Argentine independent cinema, stories of the Jewish diaspora and films of daily life. Who it's not for: anyone wanting a defined plot and a dramatic peak, or who will find the scene of the father's return too subdued.